The Kids in the Capital ABC Photo Challenge

So you know I love the subject of family fun in Ottawa, and you know I love photography, and you know I love taking pictures of my kids doing fun things around Ottawa, right?

Then how could I not love the ABC Challenge that GlidingLara introduced on their awesome new group blog, Kids in the Capital. The blog itself is terrific, a constantly-updated source of ideas and entertainment for family fun in Ottawa.

And the ABC Challenge is right up my alley. Lara said,

In the next 14 weeks I will get at least one photo I am proud of in each of the categories (in no particular order) in my following ABC list. Every week I will present you with 2 of the photos (hmmm, maybe photos from two categories so I can show you more if I feel like it), as well as a photography tip I have discovered that I can share with you. […] And I would love it if you would join me! I set up a flickr group where we can all share our photos with each other. Together we can not only share our beautiful photos but highlight some of the amazing spots in our fabulous city, from all its different angles.

Here’s the official ABC list:

Art
Books
Climbing
Discovery
Eating
Friends
Green
Hugging
Inside
Jumping
Kisses
Laughing
Mealtime
Night
Outside
Playing
Quiet
Riding
Swinging
Trees
Umbrella
Vehicles
Wet
Xcited (OH! Cheater!)
Yellow
Zoom

Fun, eh? I like this idea so much, in fact, that I’m having a hard time restraining myself. I mean, I could fill an entire blog with pictures of kids on the loose in Ottawa — oh wait, I already have!! So you need to join this group and help dilute my presence there, okay? ๐Ÿ˜‰

I’ve already spammed the pool with entries for Friends and Wet based on my adventures with Alex and Angela this week. This is one is for F is for Friends:

Beach Buddies

And I simply couldn’t choose between these three for W is for Wet:

Hello rock!

432:1000 Splash TtV

That`s COLD!

And my first entry was this one, O is for Outside:

429:1000 Spring at the park TtV

Lara is also posting her progress weekly on the blog, and providing photography tips and tutorials, so be sure to follow along.

Thanks, Kids in the Capital, for this excellent new project! And, erm, I’ll try to restrain myself from adding too many pix. ๐Ÿ™‚

Toddlers on the beach

For someone who is fundamentally opposed to change, it’s amazing how delightfully refreshing a break in routine can be. Yesterday, I feel like I played hooky and had the most amazing escape from my daily reality. I took a quick road trip down to visit Angela and her adorable son Alex on a little island on the St Lawrence. Bliss!

The day started out a little shaky — I was late dropping Simon off with my mom for the morning and then I realized I forgot my wallet at home and had to double back. Lucas was first chatty and then fussy as we flew down the 416 trying to make up a bit of time, and then I realized why he’d been fussing when he gacked all over himself just as we made the turn onto the 401.

But look at how the day turned out!

Beach Buddies

As if spending a morning with a fun, smart lady whom I admire deeply and her absolutely charming son who is a perfect match for Lucas in all ways weren’t enough, they just happen to live in one of the most gorgeous areas of the province.

Angela

Angela is an *amazing* photographer, and looking at her pictures daily inspires me to do better with my own pictures. Check out her Flickr account!

That`s COLD!

I’m sure the water must have been just a few degrees above freezing — Alex’s face says it all! (And yet, the boys were not at all reluctant to splash around — kids are crazy!)

A and A

It’s always such a treat to find another mom who has exactly the same sort of thresholds that you do — especially a mom who has a toddler who matches yours in both fiestiness and charm! Yes, you may splash at the water’s edge. No, you may not eat that rock. Yes, your pants are soaked. No, you may not wade out past your ankles.

431:1000 Toddlers on the beach

In the end, I think this is my favourite shot of the day — a perfect moment in a perfect morning. I wish I could bottle it up and keep it under my pillow and sip from it when the days are a little less than perfect.

Thanks, Angela and Alex, for a wonderful morning. By the time I was pulling back into the city, I felt as lighthearted as if I’d been on vacation for a week. Lesson learned: absconding from the housework and the computer and the daily grind for a little escape from routine is good for the soul!

Edited to add: I forgot when I wrote this post this morning that I still had all my through-the-viewfinder shots to post — here they are!

Buddies on the beach TtV

Boots on the beach

Hello rock!

Splash TtV

Todders on the Beach TTV Collage

Turns out TtV is well-suited to capturing the essence of toddlers on the beach!!

Okay, bloggy peeps, talk to me about bicycles

Sheesh, can you tell I’m on a self-improvement kick? Healthier foods, the 100-push-up challenge (are you in?) and now — I’m thinking of bicycling in to work. Can you tell I get all fired up by the spring sunshine?

It’s about a 10 km jaunt from home to work for me. Most of it is along Woodroffe Avenue (four lanes at 80+ km/h — eek! — but with a lovely bike lane set off from the road) and it’s largely flat. I just need another week or so to psyche myself into it, and a day with nothing planned for first thing in the morning, just in case it takes me two hours instead of the anticipated 40 minutes to make the trek!

And of course, like any new convert, now that I’m thinking of biking seriously I’m also thinking about upgrading my gear. Just this past weekend I bought myself a nice 1L coffee thermos so I can make a pot to go rather than ride through the drive-thru at Timmy’s, which was my biggest hurdle. Oh wait, you mean I’m supposed to be coveting bike-related gear? Yeah, that too!

I have a really nice bike. It’s about 15 years old, and has had, um, only moderate wear through the years. Let’s just say it got a lot more wear in the seven years before the babies arrived than it has since! It was a good investment at the time — I spent about $400 on it, and it’s still in pretty good shape. It’s not the most comfortable bike in the world, though. The handlebars are too low, and I have tried unsuccessfully to get them raised. I want one of those new cushy seats, too. Let’s face it, an ass in its 40s deserves a bit of comfort!

A year or so ago, I saw one of those retro-cruising bikes, and instantly coveted it. The big white-wall tires, the fenders, the pastel colours? Covet! But, are they practical? I don’t even know which type of bike I want — or, more specifically, which one is the best investment for the kind of riding I’ll be doing. A one-speed cruiser might be a little simplistic for the 10 km communte, no? (Who am I kidding, even with my current 21-speed bike, I only use about three of them and usually only then when I change gears by accident!) The hybrid bikes look like a good choice, and my cousin suggested I make sure I get something without those big knobby wheels if I’m planning on doing a lot of city riding.

Gah, so many choices!

I was surfing around the bike shop Web sites, and it seems like the base bike-shop price is more than $500 — about double what I was thinking I’d spend. (And think of the gorgeous camera lens I could get with $500!) But then, my existing bike is a testament to investing in a good product. Canadian Tire has a bunch in the $200 range. Can someone tell me the difference, and whether it’s really worth the extra $$ for a casual rider like me? I’m not out to win any races, I just want a comfy bike that will make me want to ride it.

Talk bike to me, bloggy peeps. What features do you love and hate about your bike? What do you covet? What should I watch out for? Is it worthwhile to invest in a $500+ bike that will last me another 15 years? (Ack, just realized that will bring me to age 55 and retirement — I think I have to go lie down now. When did I get to be so old???)

The push-up challenge

I like to think of myself as strong. Not just emotionally, but physically strong, too. I’ve got a pretty good constitution, and I know my legs are strong because I regularly set the weight machines at the gym to about double where I find them at. I can easily do a dozen or more leg extensions and curls at 100 lbs, and I’m finding the lower back extension thingee a little too easy at 160 lbs lately.

What I lack, though, is upper body strength. It drove me crazy that even after carrying around my ginormous babies who turned into ginormous toddlers, and even after religiously following a weekly strength-training routine at the gym for at least the past five years, I still couldn’t do a single proper from-the-toes push-up. I’d been doing a dozen push-ups from my knees for a while now, but each time I tried to push up from my toes with my body straight, I’d collapse in a quivering heap.

Last weekend, with sleeveless season on the horizon and my 41st birthday not far behind, I decided I needed to challenge myself. I was going to learn how to do a proper push-up once and for all. I’d start with one, if that’s all I could achieve, and add one or two more each week during my sacred Saturday morning visit to the gym.

Because it was a long weekend, I managed three trips to the gym last week instead of the usual one. My first visit, on the Friday, I managed one whole push-up. I doubled that on Saturday, and made it all the way to five push-ups on the Monday. (And then, I couldn’t raise my arms above my head on Tuesday or Wednesday.)

This past Saturday, I was actually looking forward all through my workout to the matwork I usually save for the end. I figured I’d squeeze out six, maybe even seven push-ups, and I was absolutely delighted with myself when I quavered out a tremulous TEN of them. Never mind the fact that I could barely work my arms enough to drive the car on the way home.

So proud of myself was I, and so in need of an explanation as to why my arms wavered in the breeze like overcooked spaghetti, that I bragged to Beloved about my accomplishment. Tristan, listening from the kitchen, scoffed, “Ten? Sheesh, that’s nothing, I could do ten push-ups.”

Without thinking about his easy prowess on the monkey bars, I told him to go ahead, showoff, and show me your stuff. Which he did. Easily. I figure he might have gotten to 20 or more before he broke a sweat, but I stopped him before he could show me up too badly. And then to add insult to injury, Beloved, who is let us say not as fond of the gym as me, also dropped and showed me 10 in fine form.

Lesson learned: it’s good to be strong, but sometimes strong and silent is a harder skill to learn!

Okay, bloggy peeps, ‘fess up. Can you do push-ups the hard way, with your back straight from your shoulders to your heels? I’m aiming for 25 by my birthday, but I may have to cut down on my blog posts because a day and a half after achieving those glorious 10 I can still barely move my arms to type this!

Five steps to the perfect grilled hamburger

It’s true, not that long ago I considered “cooking” to be preheating the oven and opening the box. It’s also true that while I’m a bit of a Johnny-come-lately to the wholesome food movement, I’ve embraced it with my whole heart. When I was blogging the other day about my 5-ingredient chicken fingers, it got me thinking about some of the other culinary skills I’ve acquired over the last couple of years.

You know what I cook really well? Hamburgers. Grilled hamburgers. My mouth is watering just thinking about it! And so with a weekend pending and BBQ season upon us, I thought I’d share five tips to hamburger perfection. (No, my entire cooking repertoire does not revolve around the number 5. I don’t think.)

1. Start with ground meat. What I mean here is forget the frozen pucks, and skip the pre-formed fresh patties, too. Did you know you pay more just for them to make little circles out of your ground beef? Take off your rings and get your hands dirty, it’s worth it! (I haven’t tried ground chicken or turkey yet, but more power to you if you can get away with it. My persistently low iron likes a little red meat a couple of times a week! And while extra lean is best for you health-wise, the extra fat in lean pretty much burns off on the grill, so you can save a few more pennies there.)

2. Don’t overhandle the meat. Break it up with a fork in a big bowl. Dump some breadcrumbs or oats on top, and either a whole egg or just the yolk. Add a little salt and pepper, and if you’re like that, chop up 1/4 cup or so worth of onions and throw that in there. A splash of Worcestershire sauce gives it a little zing, too! Stir it up just enough to combine the ingredients, but try not to overmix it.

3. Make perfect patties. I finally figured out how to keep my burgers from bulging in the middle. I take roughly enough hamburger so that I can close my hands around it, and rather than making a ball and then squishing it into a patty, I form it directly into a disk. A fine distinction, ’tis true, but it makes the difference in a burger you can get your jaws around!

4. Only flip it once. This is key!! On a hot grill, cook for about six minutes, flip, and cook for another five. Baste with bbq sauce if you must — I often forget. If you’re making cheeseburgers, add cheese and cook for one more minute… just enough to make it melty but not runny. Again, it’s a fine distinction!

5. Use the new skinny buns. Have you tried them? A nice crusty kaiser bun is nice, too, but we love those new thin whole-wheat buns. A little bit of a chewy compliment to the burger itself, and just perfect!

Creatures of habit that we are, we usually have baked beans and a nice leafy salad with hamburgers. What do you think? At the very least, now I know what I’m making for dinner tonight!

Edited to add:
as I was typing this up, I knew I was forgetting something! Bonus tip: do not, under any circumstance, squish the patties on the grill!! All the yummy juicy moisture will run out, and your burgers will be dry.

Five lessons I learned during my first family portrait shoot

Look what I did this weekend!

Baby Everitt: 6 of 10

No, I didn’t go out and have another boy… but after spending a lovely morning taking pictures of Baby Everitt and his sweet parents, I sure was thinking about it!!

Everitt is the son of my friends Sheila and Rob, and this was my first ever not-my-family photo shoot! Exciting — and more than a little nerve-wracking!! It’s one thing to be taking pictures of your own kids, when you can boss them around or give up and try again later, but to take on the responsibility of capturing decent pictures of somebody else’s family was a lot more stressful than I expected!!

Everitt, who turned four weeks old the day these pictures were taken, was a dream baby. His bright blue eyes watched the crazy chattering lady with the clicky black camera with bright interest and infinite patience. His parents, bless them, were equally patient.

I had some ideas in my head going in of shots I could take like classic newborn poses, close-ups of fingers and toes, and other examples I’ve seen. Trouble is, even babies don’t sit still and they can be as wriggly and vexatious as toddlers! And I certainly didn’t want to stress out mom or baby when they’d been kind enough to invite me in. So I kind of went with the flow, and while I did a little “stand here, move the baby this way” kind of directing, mostly I moved around and tried not to be too intrusive.

Here’s five things I learned about taking pictures of newborn babies:

1. The macro filter works great on fingers and toes, but unless you capture the baby’s face straight on, one of the eyes will be out of the plane of focus. Applies equally to the nifty fifty wide open at f1.8.

Baby Everitt: 7 of 10

2. Shoot in RAW for extra exposure control, and what you can’t fix in RAW you can hide with B&W!

Baby Everitt: 3 of 10

3. Even when baby fusses a bit, snap a couple of frames.

Baby Everitt: 4 of 10

(And this one, too. It was almost a discard, but the more I looked at it the more I thought it captured something essential and lovely about those early, bleary days with a new baby in the family!!)

Baby Everitt: 10 of 10

4. Keep an eye on your LCD when the light is harsh or contrasty. I had to toss more than half the images because the baby’s face was overexposed beyond redemption in the bright light streaming in through the window. Next time, I’m bringing a muslin sheet to cover the windows — or at least draw the curtains a bit. I’m used to northern light — southern light is much harsher!

Baby Everitt: 5 of 10

5. It’s hard to go wrong when you start out with a really gorgeous family as your subject!

Baby Everitt: 2 of 10

Not bad for my first time out of the house! There’s a few more worth sharing on Flickr, should you be curious enough to see more. ๐Ÿ™‚ Thank you so much, Sheila and Rob and especially Everitt, for inviting me into your home and for being so darn photogenic!

Outdoor family fun: Make yer own sidewalk paint!

In years to come, they’ll talk about 2010 as the year that Easter fell in mid-summer. Yesterday, Ottawa was the warmest place in Canada with a high temp of 27C — that’s around 85F and the same temp as Miami, Florida!

Even without the extraordinary temperatures, I get excited when the winter finally breaks for spring. I’m inordinately delighted to see the toboggans and mittens replaced with skipping ropes and fooz-ball sets. In this warmer-than-average spring, we’ve already long since broken out the sidewalk chalk and bubbles, so I was looking for something fun to enjoy the lovely day. After lingering longingly over the (rather expensive) Crayola sets in the store, we decided to make my our sidewalk chalk paint!

Sidewalk chalk 6

It’s crazy easy: just stir together equal parts corn starch and water, and a couple drops of food colouring. We had to crank up the corn starch in our first batch because it came out too runny, but our second batch turned out perfectly! It looks a little watery when you paint it out, but as the water evaporates the colours become more vivid.

Sidewalk chalk 5

We tried regular brushes, but they were a little bit too small for the job. We found that the square foam brushes you use to paint household trim worked much better! We started out painting the driveway, and quickly moved on to bricks, garden fixtures and even the lamp post. And then, rather predictably, things disintegrated into a spatter-fest that would make Jackson Pollack proud.

Sidewalk chalk 1

We used about a half a box of corn starch and maybe a dozen drops of food colouring — that’s a full evening of creative, outdoor entertainment for less than $2. Oh, and did I mention? It washes out cleanly in water!

Sidewalk chalk 2

Introducting our newest sponsor: the National Arts Centre!

I‘m delighted to say thank you and welcome to the latest hand-picked supporter of the blog, the National Arts Centre! Please take a moment to admire the little ad in the sidebar to your right. ๐Ÿ™‚

If you live in Ottawa, chances are you have been to the NAC. But did you know they’re celebrating their 40th anniversary this year? (Coincidentally, two of my other favourite things, Sesame Street and me, are also 40!) And in their 40th year, they’ve embraced digital media with a vengeance — this is not your grandmother’s NAC!!

Did you know they’ve got a blog and they’re on Twitter? How about YouTube? Flickr? Podcasts? They’ve totally embraced the social media milieu, with great results.

And how cool is this? There’s an interactive service called NAC Music Box, where you can search the NAC archives and make playlists of your favourites. I love it!

Thanks, NAC, for your support, and welcome to the Mothership!